Filed under: Betas, Classes, Culture, Game mechanics, Launches, New titles, Reviews, PvE, Opinion, Free-to-play, Hands-on, First Impressions, Dungeons, Diablo III

Like many gamers in their mid-20s, I spent countless hours in my teenage years smashing through dungeons and hunting for loot in Diablo II. The dark visual style and deep itemisation system made building effective characters a real challenge, and periodic ladder resets kept the loot-hunting economy fresh. Fast-forward 10 years and the highly anticipated sequel Diablo III was released to some serious complaints. The servers were offline for weeks at a time, the always-online DRM caused a stir, and the endgame item grind was severely underwhelming.

Indie developer Grinding Gear Games aims to beat Blizzard at its own game with its new free-to-play action RPG Path of Exile. The game boasts a dark art style and an unprecedented level of character customisation that lets players build truly unique characters. Each skill is itemised as a gem that can be slotted into your gear and augmented with dozens of different support gems. The sprawling passive skill system is better described as a "skill octopus," with millions of different ways to build a character. I've spent the past few weeks smashing up monsters in the Path of Exile open beta and absolutely loving it.

Read on to find out why I can honestly say that Path of Exile is the sequel Diablo II deserved.

Continue reading Path of Exile hands-on: The sequel Diablo II deserved

Path of Exile hands-on: The sequel Diablo II deserved originally appeared on Massively on Mon, 11 Feb 2013 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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